Sperm banking 'underused by cancer patients'

Despite being an effective way to preserve fertility in adolescents with cancer, sperm banking is underused, a recent study has claimed.

Only 18 per cent of the patients studied by researchers at Hamilton Health Sciences opted to bank their sperm before cancer treatment.

In male cancer patients, surgery, radiation and chemotherapy may result in transient or permanent infertility by affecting either erectile or ejaculatory function or by impairing the generation of sperm.

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Those who did opt to have their sperm banked and who overcame their cancer had a 36 per cent fertility success rate using intrauterine insemination - injecting sperm into the uterus  and 50 per cent using in vitro fertilisation, according to the results due to be published in the September issue of the journal Cancer.

Lead study author Michael Neal stated: 'Improvements in the field of assisted conception are providing a great chance for male cancer survivors to father children of their own after potentially fertility-damaging treatment.'

The researchers involved in the study suggested that the effects of treatment on reproduction may not be adequately addressed in clinical practice.

Sperm banking involves the storage of sperm in liquid nitrogen tanks, a technique first used in 1965.

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